Does my water heater have a bad thermostat?

[hj]

heater

The plumber replaced the thermostat today, but the breaker is STILL off, because when I got home from work, the water that came out of the hot tap in the kitchen was a few degrees short of pure steam.

That condition, before you turned off the breaker, is when the heater can reach explosive conditions. You have to realize that it also has to have other problems at the same time for it to happen, but once all the stars are in alignment, it can happen. High watt density elements are a single loop like a "U". Low watt density ones, which are somewhat better, are a double loop. The best are Ni-cad or stainless steel, but you don't get those for $9.00.

 

[GrumpyPlumber]

The clip was cool! Years ago, my parents' water heater overheated, but it just flooded the basement with scalding water that came out of that tube leading from the check valve (which I suppose is fortunate, after viewing that clip!)

Perhaps I need a better plumber, but I always seem to need better contractors in general. The amount of things I've paid to have done, only to demand they be done over is close to 100%. My only reliable contractor is my floor tile guy.

Unfortunately, I live in a small rural town, and there's one plumber (he's the guy who wanted $325 to replace one thermostat) and he seems to have "captive audience" syndrome. Our bathroom contractor has his own plumber, and he's the one who's done the plumbing for both of out bathroom remodels as well as replace the water heater thermostat. After the job on the water heater... well, let's just say I hope he's better at sweating pipes!




Yes! Somehow I totally missed that post. Funny how my "$325 for a thermostat" local plumber is convinced that elements never go bad!

I bet you're right, and in fact, I bet the element got damaged while the water was shut off (for 3-4 days) while the bathroom remodel contractors were working on the bathroom plumbing. I bet the water level went down in the water heater and exposed the element to air and that damaged it.

I don't know if it's possible, so that's just a guess, but I do know they had the water off for a few days, and I also know that we have a timer on our back yard yard hose (which is lower than the water heater) that was set to water some new sod out back. I think when the timer opened the valve, the water in the pipes ran out and maybe siphoned some water out of the heater from the supply side or something.

Ahhh, I'm probably sounding like an idiot now. In any case, I bet you're right about the element. How do I check the elements, or do I just replace them both to be safe?

I see a pattern.

I see this pattern constantly.

You get what you pay for, for more to have an experienced service plumber come in and repair your water heater the RIGHT way, and give you peace of mind.
OR have a new construction plumber do it for $100 and find yourself once again unhappy with the work.

What you have to understand is plumbers have a cost of doing business, this cost is something learned the hard way.
Often the lowest priced plumber will also be the least experienced, you'll get the work cheap, and he either learns to raise prices to account for his expenses, or he goes out of business.

Here's food for thought...

For less than $50 you could rebuild your own heater, if it blows up because you incorrectly wired something, your homeowners ins won't cover the damages.
You can get an uninsured "newbie" to do it for $100, he may or may not have liability, but the fact that he's licensed might get you coverage on your own insurance.

You can pay $200+, come home to hot water with no thought on worrying about what may go wrong in the future.

Here's another thought...
On occasion, when I get the impression that a new customer is price shopping I will actually quote a higher price to guage reaction and expedite time spent on the phone.

If they schedule, the price goes down.

If they say "I'll get back to you", I have saved myself money, and more importantly, future time negotiating my price whenever they call back down the road.

Some plumbers will play the add-on game, tell you what you want over the phone and explain there are substantial add-ons once the jobs starts.

I FULLY understand your perspective, I have been robbed blind on more occasions than I care to admit by auto mechanics, took years to find someone honest.

Finding a reasonable, honest & reliable plumber is best done by asking around, word of mouth is untouchable as the best way to find ANY good service or product.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[GrumpyPlumber]

The plumber replaced the thermostat today, but the breaker is STILL off, because when I got home from work, the water that came out of the hot tap in the kitchen was a few degrees short of pure steam.

That condition, before you turned off the breaker, is when the heater can reach explosive conditions. You have to realize that it also has to have other problems at the same time for it to happen, but once all the stars are in alignment, it can happen. High watt density elements are a single loop like a "U". Low watt density ones, which are somewhat better, are a double loop. The best are Ni-cad or stainless steel, but you don't get those for $9.00.

...and if I had a nickle for every customer that reacted as though I were just trying to sell therm something unecessary when explaining this, I'd be retired now.

 

[cdwz]

I see a pattern.

I'm sure you do. Or at least you think that you do.

You get what you pay for, for more to have an experienced service plumber come in and repair your water heater the RIGHT way, and give you peace of mind.
OR have a new construction plumber do it for $100 and find yourself once again unhappy with the work.

I understand that you get what you pay for, and I have no problem paying for quality work. We moved into this house in May of 07, and so far we have spent approximately $50,000 on renovations. $20k was proceeds from the sale of our previous house. The rest was out of pocket.

My problem is not paying for quality work. It's paying for quality work and still getting shoddy work that often needs to be done over. If I'm going to have shoddy work, I might as well do it myself and have it look like hell for free.

I'm not stupid. I know what I know, and I know what I don't know. I understand that this forum is full of people who have forgotten more about plumbing, landscaping, heating, and cooling than I will probably ever know in my life, and I respect that. But I'm not completely clueless.

From 1991 to 1997 I worked at various architectural and MEP firms doing CADD drafting. Before that, I spent 4-1/2 years with IBEW local 26 doing residential and commercial electrical work. I learned enough to do basic wiring and to keep myself out of trouble. Years ago I wired a garage addition for my stepfather (including the installation of a sub-panel) and when I pulled the panel cover off for the inspector, he smirked and said he didn't need to see anything else and approved the entire job.

I know this is small potatoes compared to 99% of the people here, but the point is, I'm not totally in the dark about everything home related. I know what I'm comfortable doing, and I pay to have the rest done.

Here's another thought...
On occasion, when I get the impression that a new customer is price shopping I will actually quote a higher price to guage reaction and expedite time spent on the phone.

That's your right, as a contractor. However, when people (and this includes myself) don't know what something normally costs, they call around and get prices. It's part of the process. I had no idea how much it cost to replace the heat pump in our house, so I called around and got some estimates. That gave me an idea as to how much we were going to spend. In the end, we went with the person who sounded the least put out to give us a quote, and we got a great system.

If someone seems like they're high-balling me (like $325 to replace one thermostat on our water heater) I'm going to get a second quote. Sure, it would be great for everyone here if homeowners just called you and hired you on the spot without worrying about the price, but you can't fault people for not wanting to get ripped off.

One of our jobs was having our veranda out back re-screened. Our usual contractor quoted us $2000. Needless to say, we declined. Later he admitted that he high-balled the estimate because he hates doing screening, so if we went for the $2k, great, but if we said no, that was just as well. How do I know the $325 to replace the thermostat wasn't the same type of deal? So I have to try another plumber (who tells me I can do it myself) to see if that's what they all charge.

You're right about word of mouth. Unfortunately, we haven't lived in this town long enough to know who's reputable and who isn't. So far, all of our "problem" contractors have been recommendations from someone else in town. Obviously that hasn't worked out very well, so we're in this mode where we hire someone for a small job to see what kind of work he does. If we like him, we hire him for the big stuff. It's a tough process, but I don't know what else to do.

This week I got an invoice from a contractor that was almost double what his original estimate was, so I'm a little torqued about it. He basically made a boo-boo while he was doing the work (damaging some drywall in another part of the house), and ended up having to put some labor into it to fix the screw up. Now that we've gotten the invoice, it looks like he's hiked the price on all the materials to cover the cost of the labor he had to put into the repairs.

And yes, this was someone who came highly recommended by someone else in town.

The light at the end of the tunnel is that the renovations we have planned are almost over, so we'll be able to (hopefully) soon just live here without it being a construction zone. That day can't come soon enough.

 

[Terry]

And just to be fair to the homeowner here.

If the first contractor had just done the job the first time, there wouldn't have been a need to post any of this.

It is nice that he can come here, and converse about how things normally go on a job like this.

 

[hj]

invoice

This week I got an invoice from a contractor that was almost double what his original estimate was, so I'm a little torqued about it. He basically made a boo-boo while he was doing the work (damaging some drywall in another part of the house), and ended up having to put some labor into it to fix the screw up. Now that we've gotten the invoice, it looks like he's hiked the price on all the materials to cover the cost of the labor he had to put into the repairs.

How does that work? Is he working time and materials? If he didn't want to use his own time to fix it, he should have called his insurance company. The only time and material major revisions should be those that have such vague specifications, or are so complex, that they have to be evaluated and priced in real time. Even then there should be some prior agreement as to how the pricing will be done, i.e., list/retail less 20% and labor at $***.xx per hour.

 

[cdwz]

How does that work? Is he working time and materials? If he didn't want to use his own time to fix it, he should have called his insurance company. The only time and material major revisions should be those that have such vague specifications, or are so complex, that they have to be evaluated and priced in real time. Even then there should be some prior agreement as to how the pricing will be done, i.e., list/retail less 20% and labor at $***.xx per hour.

I got a written estimate for the job, which was basically to R&R the bath tub in one bathroom with a soak tub, R&R the fixture, and install a sliding bypass door. Additionally he was to R&R the shower stall in the master bath and prep it to be tiled, and also a new fixture and swinging door on that stall once the tile (done by another contractor) was done.

His estimate was for "installation" and included an allowance amount. I asked him what that meant, and he said he words his estimates that way to prevent customers from asking for items (faucets, etc) that were ridiculously more expensive than what he estimated for.

He had a $150 allowance for each faucet, and gave me a collection to choose from. I chose a pair from his collection, and they were each over $200 (one was closer to $250). With the door, I just told him what finish I wanted the frame to be, and what type of glass I wanted, and the one he installed was more than double what his allowance was.

Nothing was time and materials on the job. It was all a per job quote. The problem was that the invoice is almost double what I signed off on.

I've emailed him with a list of questions asking why the invoice is so far off the quoted amount. We'll see what he says.

 

[cdwz]

Well, if you installed "high watt density elements" which are the most popular HD version, you will probably have to replace them again in a few months, or may weeks.

I meant to answer this earlier, sorry.

I took pic (as I almost always do) of the replacement process. The original elements were the ones you recommended, but the new ones were the ones you recommended against. I asked the owner of the hardware store about the better elements, and he said he stopped carrying them because there's so much lime/whatever in the water that no matter which element you pick, they all get fouled in the same amount of time, so people were opting for the cheaper ones.

Here are the pics. You can see how bad the deposits are.

 

[cdwz]

The element removal tool de la morte. the thing's about 24" long!

I had to fight to get the lower element out:

It finally came out after some gentle coaxing:


The lower element was completely encased in sediment. I used a thin wooden dowel to break it up and bit, then wet-vaced as much of it out as I could. Then I ran the water through it for about ten minutes and it looked much better on the inside. I'd still like to pour something like CLR in there to clean it up further. Maybe I'll look into that the next time I have to replace the elements.

 

[GrumpyPlumber]

Cdwz, dam.

The first guy at $325 told you elements never go.

The next guy at $100 was clueless.
You got a GC to redo several fixtures and he's billing you twice the original contract.

Either the person that referred you the contractor secretly hates you, or your a magnet for hacks.

Though I do beleive there are two sides to every story, your luck sounds awful.

 

[Master Plumber Mark]

you made a mistake...

you almost gotit right but you should have made
yourself a tool and reached into that heater and
pulled out all the lime.....

what you have now is a new element sitting about a half
inch above the old lime in the tank.....

you absolutely MUST clean out as much lime as possible
from that tank or you will be doing it again in a few months...


the SS elements are the best way to go.

here is what your floor should have looked like if you would have
really gotten into it right..

note my special "patented" copper lime scrapeing tool in the picture......

 

[Dunbar Plumbing]

Wow, that looks like that heater puked and ruined christmas all in one shot!

 

[cdwz]

Either the person that referred you the contractor secretly hates you, or your a magnet for hacks.

Well the thing is, we've used this guy before (the double price one) and he's always done decent work and given us reasonable prices. This is by far the largest job we've given him though, and the first one where he's had to bring other people in (i.e. the plumber to do the plumbing work). I have no idea what's going on with him.

here is what your floor should have looked like if you would have really gotten into it right..

Whoa!

Well Mark, you definitely put my de-liming job to shame! This is what I ended up with:


I basically used a long, narrow, flat piece of wood to scoop the muck out, then sucked it into the wet-vac as I pulled it out of the heater. I only spent about 20 minutes pulling it out, and the rest went out the garden hose. I'm 100% sure there's a huge amount left though.

I may re-drain it sometime this weekend and go at it again to try to get more out.

What do you guys think of the whole-house water filters? There's a guy at our video store who swears by his.

 

[Redwood]

A whole house filter will not stop the mineral deposits from forming in a water heater. The minerals are disolved in the water and will pass right through even the finest filter. The minerals precipitate out of solution when the water is heated.

 

[cdwz]

I hate answers like that lol


This lime is a real problem, not only for the water heater, but for everywhere else we have water.

It musses the inside of the dishwasher, it musses the faucets, it musses the shut-off valves for most of the plumbing fixtures. I wish there was a way to get rid of it.

 

[Master Plumber Mark]

wet vac is a good idea but.....

the wet vac is not a bad idea and I wish
I could make one suck up thlse large clods of lime...

I usually will clean out the water heater and pull out the lime with the heater still full of water......

it comes out slowly and as long as their is a floor
drain near by, you can really use the water and my
"special patent pending tool" to flush out the lime better...


this procedure can make a hell of a mess..
and should only be done
where their can be no other damages

 

[Kordts]

I just changed 9 elements on a 100 gallon electric 440 3 phase w.h. at a power plant. The tank was about 1/3 full of scale. I ended up changing the drain to a full port ball valve. I cleaned as much out through the inlet feed as possible then started filling it and poking a coathanger thru the drain valve. My partner kept squeegieing the water towards the floor drain and after about 20 minutes the tank was finally cleaned out. This water heater feeds 4 showers in the women's locker room, and there are only two women per shift at the most. I think each lady basically has their own shower

 

[Jadnashua]

The only way to get the minerals out of the water is to install a water softener.